Lydia is killed in a car accident but she returns to her bereft sister as a benign ghost who nonetheless comes to haunt the lives of those around her in unexpected ways: Jonathan Goldman whose flat Lydia is running from when she is knocked down; his daughter Stella who has discovered that her father has been having an affair with the gladiatorial Sonia; Stellas genius painter-boy lover Izzy whom she leaves behind as she flees to the arms of kindly Peregrine. Along with good stepmothers bad mothers strange professors & wicked monks their lives collide in a breathtaking finale.